Why Japan lost the Battle of Midway

Any hardcore history fans going to mention that Yorktown was still afloat after Hiryu's first counter-attack and its damage repair crews did such a good job putting out the fires that the second attack wave mistook it for an untouched carrier, saving Enterprise and Hornet. Even after the second attack it was STILL afloat, they attempted to salvage it but a submarine finally finished the job.

Lest we forget the acts of incredible heroism by the likes of McClusky, Kleiss, Best, and their comrades. Great men all.

Just to add, the US torpedo bombers not only drew away and exhausted the Japanese combat air patrol, but more importantly brought the Zeros down to sea level, so they weren't in position to attack the dive bombers at their height before the US planes made their attack dives.

One thing that is over looked in most videos about Midway is that it wasn't so much the loss of the four aircraft carriers , but the loss of the pilots and aircrew . Later in the war Japan was able to build new carriers but was never able to replace the highly skilled veteran aircrew . What replacements that were put aboard were easily shot down .

Let's not forget Roosevelt. He pushed to start building those carriers in the late thirties.

When I was a kid we had a neighbor who was personally responsible for the loss of 26 Japanese aircraft in WWII. He was the worst mechanic in the Japanese military.

God bless these men. And let us never forget the their sacrifices....we owe these men everything.

The Japanese planes did not finish off the USS Yorktown, but it was a japanese submarine that did. She was able to stay afloat after being bombed by the japanese. She was, then, being pulled by one of her allied ships, but was hit by a torpedo attack.

Wade McClusky, from Buffalo, NY, made a gutsy call that allowed it all to happen.

This is the best (and briefest) explanation of the Battle of Midway of those I have watched on YouTube.

Jolly good job. Instead of taking an hour to explain this action (like so many others), you summed it up well in 16 minutes. That's what we like.

I love Catalinas/PBYs. They're slow, they're ugly in a way, but they always seem to be in the right place at the right time, like 6:47 and 8:13 of this video and during the hunt for the Bismarck. Only recently have I learned about the "Black Cat" night operations in the Pacific, which increased my love for them even more.

Hearing and reading about this battle never fails to send chills down my spine.

Montemayor has an excellent set of animated videos showing how Midway proceeded from the Japanese point-of-view, using only the data that Japanese commanders had and showing why they made their decisions on the day.

The Japanese had a terrible habit of making over-complicated battle plans and dispersing their forces into many subunits that approached the battle area outside of supporting range of one another. Coral Sea, Midway, Eastern Solomons, Santa Cruz, and Leyte Gulf were all battles that suffered from the Japanese habit of unnecessary dispersal of forces. There was a fifth carrier, I think it was Zuiho, with Yamamoto's battleship force. How would Midway have ended if Yamamoto had his battleships and Zuiho with the Kido Butai?

Great video!!! Also often overlooked is the ABSENCE of a possible 5th Japanese aircraft carrier at Midway. The Japanese carrier SHOKAKU was badly damaged at the Battle of the Coral Sea but had a relatively intact air group. ZUIKAKU had its air group pretty much destroyed during the same battle. Japanese DOCTRINE at the time did not allow the transfer of one carrier air group to another. Had the Japanese allowed for the transfer of that air group, perhaps ZUIKAKU would have participated at Midway and may have been the deciding factor for victory OR just been a 5th carrier sunk. USS YORKTOWNs air group was virtually destroyed and basically the only trained/combat experienced air group that the US had was from the USS SARATOGA (though most of that combat experience was from the island raids early in the war). SARATOGA, being the torpedo magnet that she was early in the war, sailed to the West Coast for repairs while her air group was flown to Hawaii. SARATOGAs air group was transferred to YORKTOWN making her combat ready as well as the Herculean efforts to repair her. THANKS!!! for at least highlighting that SHOKAKU was badly damaged and had an air group pretty much intact at Coral Sea and that ZUIKAKU was not damaged but had not much of an air group remaining - this is probably one of the very few YouTube channels that actually mentioned that fact. Also, Japan's belief in the probable sinking of YORKTOWN at Coral Sea may have also been the deciding factor in not adding an additional carrier to their strike group.

That was mesmerising and sobering. The courage on both sides was very evident. I shall have to watch it again to fully grasp how the pendulum of fate was swinging.

This was such a tremendous event in the war. Thanks for covering it. Well made video. This is also the best narrator in The imperial war museum ❤❤

The American studs who fought, died and will raised again on the last day are heroes beyond measure. My dear, brave dad, WW II, 12th Armoured Division, the Hellcats, survived and along with his brave MEN and WOMEN, saved the entire world from Hitler and Hirohito/Tojo...🙏✌️♥️🇺🇸

One of the more understated outcomes of the Battle of Midway, beyond the loss of the four Japanese fleet carriers, was the severe losses the IJN suffered in their naval aviator corps. The so many of them were highly trained veterans of actions over China and in air strikes against British holdings in Ceylon (Sri Lanka today). They were the best naval aviators in the world at the time of Pearl Harbor and the Battle of the Coral Sea. So many were lost at Midway that the IJN could not really recover. This was because the Japanese pilot training program was not designed to pump out replacements at the rate needed to man expended carrier air groups. Whereas combat experienced American aviators were rotated home to train new pilots. Many of the IJN squadrons were sent into the South Pacific and operated from Rabaul against American action in and around Guadalcanal, where they experienced more attrition. It became a negative feedback loop they would never recover from.